President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan received more than 52 percent of the votes in the weekend election. Almost half of the people voted against him. The election result strongly divides Turkey.
Risto Mattila,
Tom Kankkonen
leading the country in the Turkish presidential election Recep Tayyip Erdoğan a policy that talked a lot got a small majority of the people behind it.
For some, the future seems unfair, others see the result as the only option, according to ‘s interviews in Istanbul.
– This is no longer Atatürk’s country, he sighs Burcu Gündüz referring to the founder and first president of Turkey to Kemal Atatürk.
– Things are going in a worse direction, maybe we will reach the bottom at some point, he thinks for himself Bahattin Altunsu.
Reader Berk Esen Sabancı University knows that there are many problems and some of them are still swelling.
– Turkey is in a bad economic crisis, which is still getting worse. The economic damage caused by the earthquake is crushing. In addition, especially in the second round, the migration problem has come up, which Erdoğan has to solve, he lists.
However, according to Esen’s assessment, the result of this is that the president is not able to lead the country as tough as he has been until now.
Instead, he will probably very quickly go into “election mode”, so to speak, in order to also win the local elections for his party, which are already ten months away.
However, the sovereignty continues.
– He has already defeated many dissenters and there is no going back to a different attitude. The question is whether the authoritarian grip will deepen.
According to Esen, this depends on the position of the opposition: what kind and how united it will be. The previously mentioned local elections are also important.
The effects of Erdoğan’s policy have reached all the way to Finland, as the tension arising from the ratification of NATO membership showed.
In Western countries, Turkey’s positive attitude towards Russia and its authoritarian leader has been scrutinized. The weak position of women and Turkey’s violence against the Kurds have been appalled.
The president is difficult – if not impossible – to win in elections
Many had high hopes for a change in politics if the opposition candidate Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu would win the election.
Why didn’t he succeed?
– There are several reasons. First of all, elections in Turkey are not equal and fair. This is because the national media is under the control of the administration.
Erdoğan was able to utilize the information and communication apparatus in a completely different way than his competitors.
– The media under Erdoğan’s control smeared the opponent by linking his name to terrorist organizations. In addition, Kılıçdaroğlu’s message was certainly right, but he was not the right person to take it forward, Esen reflects.
in Istanbul Ahmet Taşan considers the election result “really good”.
– We stopped the forces dividing the country, we chose stability.